Free PRMIA 8008 Practice Exam with Questions & Answers | Set: 6

Right after inception' is incorrect as the interest rate swap (IRS) would be valued at close to zero right after inception and the credit risk would be minimum. Choice 'a' (ie 10 years, at maturity) is incorrect as at maturity there would be no more cash flows to exchange, and the replacement value of the contract would again be close to zero.

Therefore the worst time for the counterparty to default is somewhere between inception and maturity - in fact the range of possible outcomes for the contract increases with the passage of time, and we should find the worst time to default to be a later date. However, towards maturity, the value of the contract starts to go towards zero again, and the maximum value is reached around 7 years. 2 years is too early for the maximum to be reached for the 10 year IRS, and therefore choice a is the correct answer.

The VaR of a fixed income instrument is given by Duration x Volatility of the interest rate x z-factor corresponding to the confidence level. Therefore as the volatility of the yield goes up, the value at risk for the instrument goes up.

At the same time, the value of the bond is given by the present value of its future cash flows using the current yield curve. This value is unaffected by the volatility of the underlying interest rates. Therefore a change in volatility of interest rates does not affect the value of the bond.

Therefore Choice 'd' represents the correct answer.

Deterioration in the balance sheets of key counterparties is a concern for a liquidity manager even though it may not immediately affect a firm, and this is true because counterparty failures may lead to liquidity shortfalls for an institution for no fault of its own. It is important for a liquidity risk manager to watch the health of key counterparties where exposure is concentrated and take timely steps to reduce it should the health deteriorate.

Under times of liquidity stress, prepayments of loans extended will decline while withdrawals of demand deposits are likely to increase. Both will not decrease, and therefore Choice 'b' is incorrect.

A bank is exposed to the undrawn portions of a line of credit extended to a borrower as the borrower, with superior information on its own finances, is likely to draw upon undrawn lines of credit thereby increasing the bank's exposure. Therefore Choice 'a' is incorrect. Generally, a portion of the undrawn part is counted towards a liquidity outflow.

Longevity risk is the risk facing sellers of annuities that their clients will outlive their assumptions on their length of life, while mortality risk is the downside risk for an insurer that clients will die sooner than expected causing the reserves to fall short of what is needed. Therefore Choice 'd' is not correct as the opposite is true.

Analytical or parametric approaches are not useful at all for liquidity at risk calculations because there are no neat distributions available to parameterize the large number of factors that affect the calculations of liquidity inflows and outflows. Historical simulations, Monte Carlo and scenario analysis (which can complement historical scenarios) are all valid choices

The correct answer is choice 'a'

Recall the following summary of the GARCH model. The long term variance in a GARCH model is given by ω/(1 - α - β). In this case, this works out to =SQRT(0.001/(1 - 0.05 - 0.93)) * SQRT(250) = 3.54%. Yesterday's volatility of 1% is irrelevant to the question.

This is a trick question, no great science to it. Remember that the 'present value of a basis point' refers to PV01, which is the same as BPV (basis point value) referred to in the PRMIA handbook. In other textbooks, the same term is also variously called 'DV01' (dollar value of a basis point). Remember these other terms too.

PV01, or the present value of a basis point, is the change in the value of a bond (or other fixed income security) from a 1 basis point change in the yield. PV01 is calculated as (Price * Modified Duration/10,000).

Therefore Choice 'a' is the correct answer.

Ex-ante VaR calculations can differ from actual realized P&L due to a large number of reasons. I, II and III represent some of them. Mean reversion however has nothing to do with VaR estimates differing from actual P&L. Therefore Choice 'c' is the correct answer.

Offsetting trades with other counterparties will not reduce credit exposure to a given counterparty. All other choices represent means of reducing credit risk. Therefore Choice 'c' is the correct answer.

According to the first principle set out by the BCBS paper on stress testing, the Board has ultimate responsibility for the overall stress testing programme. Senior management is accountable for the implementation, management and oversight of the programme, but the overall responsibility stays with the Board of Directors of the institution. Therefore Choice 'c' is the correct answer.

Additionally, this principle lays down that stress testing should be a part of the overall governance, ie support the strategic choices made as part of business planning; and be integrated with the risk management culture of the bank, ie stress tests should be used as an input for setting the risk appetite, exposure limits, and the capital and liquidity planning processes of the bank.

High frequency and low severity risks, for example the risks of fraud losses for a credit card issuer, may have high expected losses, but low unexpected losses. In other words, we can generally expect these losses to stay within a small expected and known range. The capital requirement will be the worst case losses at a given confidence level less expected losses, and in such cases this can be expected to be low.

On the other hand, medium severity medium frequency risks, such as the risks of unexpected legal claims, 'fat-finger' trading errors, will have low expected losses but a high level of unexpected losses. Thus the capital requirement for such risks will be high.

It is also worthwhile mentioning high severity and low frequency risks - for example a rogue trader circumventing all controls and bringing the bank down, or a terrorist strike or natural disaster creating other losses - will probably have zero expected losses & high unexpected losses but only at very high levels of confidence. In other words, operational risk capital is unlikely to provide for such events and these would lie in the part of the tail that is not covered by most levels of confidence when calculating operational risk capital.

Note that risk capital is required for only unexpected losses as expected losses are to be borne by P&L reserves. Therefore the operational risk capital requirements for a low severity high frequency risk is likely to be low when compared to other risks that are lower frequency but higher severity.

Thus Choice 'c' is the correct answer.